Saturday, December 15, 2007

I dug out my old Mesa Boogie Mark III from the closet today, just to fire it up and see if I could get some use from it. The tubes really need to be replaced, but other than that this amp is in fine condition.

I got my Boogie way back in 1992 as a graduation present from my parents. Mine is a "Green Stripe" Simul Class 85watt combo with reverb and was ordered to spec from Strings and Things, Memphis which, at the time, was the local Mesa Boogie dealership. I got one of the very last Mark III's Mesa Boogie made because at the time of my order (in 1991) they were discontinuing the Mark III in favor of the Mark IV. My amp took over 6 months to be made and shipped, but it was worth the wait. I finally had a really loud, great sounding all-tube amplifier! I played this amp a lot with my buddy Jonathan (the guy who used to have his drums in my home studio), but after I quit playing guitar in college this amp got tucked away in various closets over the years. I am now going to get it back into playing shape again.

The clean channel on this amp is truly magnificent. It is very punchy, warm and round with a certain "sparkle" reminiscent of a Fender. The crunch channel has a nice Marshall-like sound and the lead channel is really unreal. Tons and tons of gain thanks to the cascading pre-amp design. When I was a kid I didn't even use a distortion pedal with this amp because I had all the gain I needed right in the amp. Now, however, I might prefer running pedals since my tastes have changed quite a bit since 1992. This amp sounds great, but has quite a bit of fizz in lead mode and tends to sound a bit too much like Carlos Santana. :) Oh, and this thing is friggin' LOUD!

Overall, I love this little amp and I have a lot of history with it. I only wish I had gotten it out sooner. I plan to have a cabinet built for it to convert it into a head so I can play it with a 2x12 or 4x12 cabinet. Should be pretty cool, so be looking for that blog entry soon.

Yeah, these little amps are really under-valued if you ask me. They have great tone and, like you said, they have more than enough volume for any type of venue. I am really enjoying it (all over again). :)

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About the Author

I love the guitar and guitar related music. I also love working on my own instruments; whether it's doing a simple setup, installing new pickups or cutting a new nut.
This blog is about my experiences with gear and the talented musicians and builders I come into contact with during the process.
Thanks for reading!